R.I.P., Billy Drago

I was very sorry to hear that Billy Drago died today––prolific character actor, cheekbone wonder, menacing Kansan, and portrayer of exquisite madmen. He was one of my favorite eccentric performers in an A-and B-movie canon (and Cannon) full of them... I've written before that his brilliant volatility ought to have resulted in warning labels on VHS tapes that said "HERE THERE BE DRAGOS."

Some classic roles included when he enforced Al Capone's reign of terror in De Palma's THE UNTOUCHABLES, engaged in complex cartel homoeroticism with Chuck Norris in DELTA FORCE 2: THE COLOMBIAN CONNECTION, preached and handled snakes in GUNCRAZY, led a punk gang against vampire Grace Jones in VAMP, ran an insane asylum in THE HERO AND THE TERROR, slithered through INVASION U.S.A. while testing all the coke, and was a frighteningly pathos-filled john in MYSTERIOUS SKIN, among many, many others. His body of work runs the gamut from arthouse films to workaday TV shows to Cannon actioners to music videos to the only episode of MASTERS OF HORROR deemed too extreme to air (directed by Takashi Miike). In each performance, he imbued his characters with a real, lived-in quality; an authenticity that was sometimes startling, sometimes nightmarish, and always profound. Here's to you, Billy: R.I.P.